TWO IN A ROW
MIKEL ARTETA would prefer to play the beautiful game.
But the way his Arsenal side dug in and fought for this victory will have given just as much jot as any free flowing 90 minutes.
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If proof were needed that the players are still performing for their under pressure manager it came here.
At the final whistle new signing Takehiro Tomiyasu fell to the ground in exhaustion.
Then he joined the rest of the back four in a collective hug after the Gunners kept a second successive clean sheet.
This needed every bit of energy the players had in their bodies to repel a relentless Burnley.
They also produced the one bit of real class - coming from the boot of Martin Odegaard as he despatched the 30th minute free kick which won the game.
After three opening defeats that is two wins in two now.
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Burnley boss Sean Dyche will point to the controversial 68th minute moment when VAR helped to overturn a penalty award for his side.
But that is just one win from Burnley’s opening five games now and not the way he would have wanted to celebrate signing a new four year deal at the club.
For all the talks of this being a tough place to come, and Arsenal were in a battle, his side have not won here in the league since last January, a run of 13 games.
Arteta had gone for an attacking line-up in a 4-3-3 formation that offered Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang more support upon front with Nicolas Pepe and Bukayo Saka either side of him.
Thomas Party and Emile Smith Rowe had come just past the hour the previous week to good effect as Arsenal recorded their first win of the season in the league at home to Norwich.
Their reward was a start alongside Martin Odegaard in midfield while the same back four that kept a clean sheet last week was kept.
They started brightly with a chance after three minutes when Kieran Tierney burst into the box and fired the ball into the six yard box.
Nick Pope at his near post stuck out a boot, the ball deflected up onto Pepe and bounced off him and back off the pitch.
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The Clarets then sounded the charge.
A massive kick from box to box by Pope offered Barnes a chance on ten minutes which he blazed over.
When Ashley Westwood chipped the ball forward Barnes was offered a free header which he steered well wide.
Then Arsenal got on the ball and Burnley tried to knock them off it.
Barnes caught Tierney with a stray elbow and was booked.
Then when Saka burst across the top of the home box Ashley Westwood felt he had no option but to clip his heels and his name went in Anthony Taylor’s book as well.
More alarmingly for Burnley was the position he had given the free kick away in, central just on the ‘D’.
As ever there is a discussion between three or four as to what is going to happen but Odegaard already knew.
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With a swing of his left boot he fired a curling shot over the wall and into the top left-hand corner.
It was his first goal since his loan move from Real Madrid to Arsenal was made permanent in a £30million deal.
Burnley returned for the second-half firing on all cylinders with James Tarkowski’s having a scissor kick effort from an angle well saved.
Then Turf Moor found new energy with the introduction of new signing Maxwel Cornet on 57 minutes.
The wide man signed from Lyon immediately gave the one-dimensional home side the flair they were missing and almost scored on 61 minutes.
Darting into the box and cutting to his right he released a shot to the far top corner that Aaron Ramsdale palmed over.
Matej Vydra had come on with Cornet as Burnley started to play the ball along the floor.
It was Vydra at the centre of the 68th minute penalty controversy that had Sean Dyche fuming.
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Ben White’s loose pass was picked up by Vydra who touched the ball to the side of Ramsdale and his outstretched leg brought the Burnley player down.
Experienced referee Anthony Taylor pointed straight to the spot but VAR Lee Mason told him to have another look at the pitch side monitor.
Once the man in the middle is told to do that he almost always changes his mind with the message from Stockley Park clearly being ‘you’ve got this wrong’.
Slowed down to frame by frame you can see that Ramsdale does get a toe on the ball after Vydra’s initial touch but still brings the player down.
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